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This is probably something you've picked up at one of those christian sites, because there's convincing evidence to be found inside some of the original writings about this source, which not only strongly suggest that some parts of that particular text were added as interpretations, not as translations, but also that it was added on a later date. I don't think I can convince you, but you should look it up.



That's why I referred to a "minimalist" version. I thought we already had this discussion where I even pointed out what the minimalist version was likely to be (sans additions).

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With the exception of the exodus,



How is it inaccurate?

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the massive field battles



Ditto.

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the global flood,



Well, that gets into the creation-evolution debate, so I'll let this one go.

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shape of the earth



We've already had this discussion here. Multiple times in fact.

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Some asian countries have (had) myths that are similar to some western or middle-eastern myths, things like that still don't prove much nor which one was first, the others could simply have been the last to write it down...



Actually, the striking similarities across such vast differences, is something Christians take great pride in. What's interesting to me is that the Hebrew story remains the most culturally neutral, whereas other cultures (ie the babylonians) add in a million little bits of their cultural nonsense.

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Some geographical and historical facts in the bible are correct, some are wrong.

Genesis 2: "A river watering the garden flowed from Eden; from there it was separated into four headwaters. The name of the first is the Pishon; it winds through the entire land of Havilah, where there is gold. The gold of that land is good; aromatic resin and onyx are also there. The name of the second river is the Gihon; it winds through the entire land of Cush. The name of the third river is the Tigris; it runs along the east side of Assur. And the fourth river is the Euphrates."

If you look this up in a map, you'll find that the Tigris indeed runs along the east side of Assur - correct so far. But the Tigris and Euphrates don't spring from a common river - which would have been be a geographical curiosity anyway, as rivers normally only separate in a river delta. And the land of Cush (Sudan) lies on an entirely different continent.

3 facts, 2 of them plain wrong - hardly "incredibly reliable", won't you agree?

For all we know, Genesis 2 was written between 900 - 1000 BC by an author dubbed "Jahwist" by historians. The location of Tigris, Euphrates and Cush were known at that time. So we can assume that either Jahwist was not very educated, or he intentionally mixed up geography to describe Eden as a mythological place that could have been anywhere. In that case the text does not contain mistakes. It only becomes wrong when misunderstood as a geography book - and then causes the typical funny apologetic explanations that I've read, such as "the land Cush was washed from Asia to Africa by Noah's flood...



Although there are several possible explanations, they rely on the absence of proof. That said, I can't provide an answer, without possibly speaking too soon. I don't know much.

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The Enuma Elish was written on tables in 1200 BC in Babylon, and is therefore the oldest written creation myth we know. Back then, the Hebrews were still nomadic tribes and had yet to invent writing. Their version (Genesis 1) was written 700 years later in the Babylonian Exile. Sure, both versions obviously have a common source, but which version was derived from which one?



I don't know for sure, do you?

Let's have a look, see. (Bab = babylonian; Heb = Hebrew)

1). Bab has multiple gods with human physical attributes (they desire sex and so forth). Heb has one God with no human physical constraints.

Before I make more points, let's look at a summary of the Enuma Elish:

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The title, an incipit, means "When on high." The epic names three primeval gods: Apsu, the fresh water, Tiamat, the salt water, and their son Mummu, apparently the mist. Several other gods are created, and raise such a clamor of noise that Apsu is provoked (with Mummu's connivance) to destroy them. Ea (Nudimmud), at the time the most powerful of the gods, intercepts the plan, puts Apsu to sleep and kills him, and shuts Mummu out. Ea then begets a son, Marduk, greater still than himself.

Tiamat is then persuaded to take revenge for the death of her husband. Her power grows, and some of the gods join her. She elevates Kingu as her new husband and gives him "supreme dominion." A lengthy description of the other gods' inability to deal with the threat follows. Ultimately, Marduk is selected as their champion against Tiamat, and becomes very powerful. He defeats and kills Tiamat, and forms the world from her corpse. The subsequent hundred lines or so constitute the lost section of Tablet V.

The gods who sided with Tiamat are initially forced to labor in the service of the other gods. They are freed from their servitude when Marduk decides to slay Kingu and create mankind from his blood. Babylon is established as the residence of the chief gods. Finally, the gods confer kingship on Marduk, hailing him with fifty names. Most noteworthy is Marduk's symbolic elevation over Enlil, who was seen by earlier Mesopotamian civilizations as the king of the gods.



If the Hebrews had really just copy catted their origins myth, then we're missing a lot of information that should have actually been copycatted.

At best, the only position (after actually reading a good portion of the Enuma Elish), one might take is to say that a few details were added or perhaps changed from the Hebrew myth to parallel the EE.

2). The Bab myth, is cultic in its function. The Heb myth is devoid of this, as I stated above.
3). That the Heb myth starts with "In the beginning," finds no parallel in the Bab myth.
4). Light, in both accounts is around before the celestial bodies are to power it, but in the Bab it has its origin in diety, whereas in the Heb account it is created by God.
5). The seperation of things is not just found in the Heb and Bab, but in various other cultures as well, and so could just as well support the "common source" hypothesis for all cultures, if you please.
6). The Heb has the creation of plants and animals that the Bab curiously is missing.
7). Celestial bodies are created in reverse, according to the Heb myth and it lacks the astrological quality of the Bab myth as well. Though both say that celestial bodies are to be used for time keeping, many cultures used it for time keeping...so....
8). The Bab myth talks about gates at the east and west of the (supposedly) flat earth, which they likely believed in. If the Jews also believed in a flat earth, and were just copy catting, then where did this little detail go?
9). The creation of man, although similar (divine "spark", and dust or dirt), is oddly (for a copy cat myth) more 'sophisticated' in the Heb version.
10). In the Bab account, man is created to perform menial tasks. However, in the Heb account man is given the image of God, and "image" language in other cultures is used to denote a ruler. So either the Hebrews expanded this ruler attribute to all men, or "power hungry" Bab rules took this away. It seems likely to me (in agreement with my source) that, in the case of copy catting, its less likely that the Heb would add this attribute to all men.
11). In the Bab account, the supposed parallel to God resting is the throwing of a party by all the other gods.

Its interesting to me to see skeptics that hold to this babylonian parallel, while others discard it because they see parallels from other cultures, like the Egyptians instead.

I would say that I agree with the Christian position that (concerning the cultural data from ALL cultures), the likely answer is that there was a common source for pretty much every creation myth. The similarities between the Bab and Heb accounts are hardly what one would expect from a copy cat myth, and if that's the case then it fits well with the "common source" pattern.

"The task force finds that...the unborn child is a whole human being from the moment of fertilization, that all abortions terminate the life of a human being, and that the unborn child is a separate human patient under the care of modern medicine."